


Now That I've Gone Too Far

by glorious_spoon



Series: Into the Rift [2]
Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Epilogue, Hospitals, Hurt/Comfort, Multi, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-04
Updated: 2018-02-04
Packaged: 2019-03-13 09:16:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 848
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13567479
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glorious_spoon/pseuds/glorious_spoon
Summary: Jonathan and Steve have a conversation in the hospital. Sort of.





	Now That I've Gone Too Far

**Author's Note:**

> This work is an epilogue to [This Far From the Borderline](http://archiveofourown.org/works/13491636/chapters/30939489) and I don't know how much sense it'll make without reading that; in short, Nancy and Jonathan rescue Steve from yet another weird Hawkins phenomenon, and they all end up in the hospital afterward.

“Byers, I swear to God, you have to get me out of here.”

“You know,” Jonathan said, slipping into the room and pulling the door shut behind him. “Nancy said basically the same thing.”

“Yeah, well, she’s a smart girl. Come on. Help a guy out here.”

“Sorry,” Jonathan said, not looking the least bit sorry. “If I break you out of the hospital, Hopper might actually arrest me.”

“How’s he doing anyway?” Steve asked, momentarily distracted.

“He’s fine. Head like a block of cement.” Jonathan edged a little closer into the room, his hands fluttering like he wasn’t quite sure what to do with them.

Steve cleared his throat. “Well, good. Sit down, you’re making me nervous.”

Jonathan gave him another flickering smile, glanced at the single chair, which was overflowing with clothes, Mike’s copy of the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons player handbook, his Walkman and a stack of cassettes, and an information sheet on tissue necrosis that one of the night nurses had given him for a little light bedtime reading.

“Just sit on the bed, it’s not like I’m a threat to your virtue in this state anyway,” Steve said, moving the plastic tray with the remains of breakfast on it to the side table. When he looked up, Jonathan’s cheeks were flaming.

Huh. Interesting.

Jonathan perched on the edge of the bed, still blushing, looking stiff and uncomfortable. “So, uh.”

“Hawkins Labs kicked my parents out of the house,” Steve offered. It was tempting to poke at Jonathan, to tease him a little, but something warned him against it. Jonathan wasn’t the sort of person who would take that kind of thing in the spirit it was intended. “The whole place is overrun with scientists.”

“So hopefully nobody else will get swallowed up by a rift in space?” Jonathan asked, smiling slightly.

“Hopefully,” Steve said. Then, “Well, if it was my dad…”

Jonathan smothered a laugh. “What’d they tell your parents?”

“Black mold. I think my dad’s gonna try to sue the contractor.”

“And what about the, uh…” he gestured at Steve’s bandaged leg.

“Feral dogs, I think. Rabies. Something like that.” Steve grinned. “The mayor is going to be hearing all about it, I’m sure.”

“Hopper’s gonna love that.”

Steve let out a breath of laughter, hesitated, then said, “Hey, so. I talked to Nancy earlier, but I never actually thanked you for getting me out of there.”

“Dustin figured it out,” Jonathan said. He was looking away, picking at the bedspread with his fingers.

“Yeah,” Steve said. “That kid is a goddamn genius, seriously. But you went in after me.”

There was an oddly tense set to Jonathan’s jaw. “It was Nancy’s idea. I didn’t, I wouldn’t have—”

“Hey,” Steve said, and reached out unthinking, to settle his hand over Jonathan’s, stilling his restless fingers. Jonathan froze at the contact, all at once, in a way that made Steve feel suddenly, inexplicably awkward, but he didn’t pull his hand away. “You went in after me. Both of you. So just— thanks, okay?”

“You’re welcome,” Jonathan muttered. He was looking at their hands, and he took a deep breath, as if he was about to say something else. Before he could, though, there was a knock at the door.

They jerked apart as Nancy pushed the door open with the base of her crutch. “I thought you might be in here,” she said as she came into the room. “Come on, they’re letting us out. _Finally._ ”

She stopped as the door swung shut, surveying them with raised eyebrows. For no reason Steve could figure out, his cheeks felt hot. He didn’t dare glance over at Jonathan to see if he was blushing, too, but he would have bet a good chunk of change on it.

For a long moment, Nancy just looked at them. Then her mouth curled into a smile— a familiar, satisfied smile, the one she always used to get when she’d managed to get a tricky question right on a practice test. _Not_ one he was expecting to see here and now. He had no idea what she’d figured out, or thought she’d figured out, or—

Whatever it was, she didn’t say it. Her smile warmed into something something warm and sweet and achingly familiar, but all she said was, “They have your discharge paperwork at the nurses’ station. I assume you’re ready to get out of here?”

“You assume right,” Steve said, swinging his legs over the edge of the bed. Jonathan leaned forward to snag his crutches from where they were leaned against the chair and passed them to him, then stood up and put some space between them. As expected, the tips of his ears were still red.

That, combined with Nancy’s warm, knowing smile, put all kinds of ideas in Steve’s head. Fantastic, _impossible_ ideas, but hey, it was Hawkins. Here, just maybe, ‘impossible’... wasn’t.

Either way, they’d have plenty of time to figure it out, so he didn’t say anything, just tucked the crutches under his arms and followed Nancy and Jonathan out of the room.


End file.
